Chapter One What Is Organizational Behavior?

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The Importance of Interpersonal Skills

Understanding OB helps determine manager effectiveness Technical and quantitative skills are important But leadership and communication skills are CRITICAL

Organizational benefits of skilled managers Lower turnover of quality employees Higher quality applications for recruitment Better financial performance

What Managers Do

They get things done through other people. Management Activities: Make decisions Allocate resources Direct activities of others to attain goals Work in an organization A consciously coordinated social unit composed of two or more people that functions on a relatively continuous basis to achieve a common goal or set of goals.

Management Functions
Monitoring performance, comparing actual performance with previously set goals, and correcting any deviation.

A process that includes defining goals, establishing strategy, and developing plans to coordinate activities.
As managers advance, they do this function more often.

Control

Plan

Lead

A function that includes motivating employees, directing others, selecting the most effective communication channels, and resolving conflicts. It is about PEOPLE!

Organize

Determining what tasks are to be done, who is to do them, how the tasks are to be grouped, who reports to whom, and where decisions are to be made.

Mintzbergs Managerial Roles: Interpersonal

Mintzbergs Managerial Roles: Informational

Mintzbergs Managerial Roles: Decisional

Katzs Essential Management Skills

Technical Skills The ability to apply specialized knowledge or expertise Human Skills The ability to work with, understand, and motivate other people, both individually and in groups Conceptual Skills The mental ability to analyze and diagnose complex situations

I have skills

Luthans Study of Managerial Activities

Is there a difference in frequency of managerial activity between effective and successful managers? Four types of managerial activity: Traditional Management Decision-making, planning, and controlling. Communication Exchanging routine information and processing paperwork Human Resource Management Motivating, disciplining, managing conflict, staffing and training. Networking Socializing, politicking, and interacting with others.

Organizational Behavior
A field of study that investigates the impact that individuals, groups, and structure have on behavior within organizations, for the purpose of applying such knowledge toward improving an organizations effectiveness.

Intuition and Systematic Study

Intuition Systematic Study

Gut feelings Individual observation Commonsense

Looks at relationships Scientific evidence Predicts behaviors

The two are complementary means of predicting behavior.

An Outgrowth of Systematic Study

Evidence-Based Management (EBM)
Basing managerial decisions on the best available scientific evidence
Must think like scientists:

Pose a managerial question

Search for best available evidence

Apply relevant information to case

Managers Should Use All Three Approaches

The trick is to know when to go with your gut. Jack Welch

Intuition is often based on inaccurate information Faddism is prevalent in management Systematic study can be time-consuming

Use evidence as much as possible to inform your intuition and experience. That is the promise of OB.

Contributing Disciplines
Many behavioral sciences have contributed to the development of Organizational Behavior
Psychology

Social Psychology

Sociology

Anthropology

Psychology
The science that seeks to measure, explain, and sometimes change the behavior of humans and other animals.
Unit

of Analysis: Individual Contributions to OB: Learning, motivation, personality, emotions, perception Training, leadership effectiveness, job satisfaction Individual decision making, performance appraisal attitude measurement Employee selection, work design, and work stress

Social Psychology

An area within psychology that blends concepts from psychology and sociology and that focuses on the influence of people on one another.
Unit

of Analysis: Group Contributions to OB: Behavioral change Attitude change Communication Group processes Group decision making

Sociology
The study of people in relation to their fellow human beings.

Unit of Analysis:
-- Organizational System
-- Group

Contributions to OB: Group dynamics Work teams Communication Power Conflict Intergroup behavior

Formal organization theory Organizational technology Organizational change Organizational culture

Anthropology

Unit of Analysis:
-- Organizational System

The study of societies to learn about human beings and their activities.

-- Group

Contributions to OB: Organizational culture Organizational environment

Comparative values Comparative attitudes Cross-cultural analysis

Few Absolutes in OB
Situational factors that make the main relationship between two variables changee.g., the relationship may hold for one condition but not another.
Contingency Variable (Z) In American Culture In Iranian or Australian Cultures
Independent Variable (X) Dependent Variable (Y)

Boss Gives Thumbs Up Sign

Understood as Complimenting

Boss Gives Thumbs Up Sign

Understood as Insulting - Up Yours!

Challenges and Opportunities for OB

Responding to Globalization Managing Workforce Diversity Improving Quality and Productivity Improving Customer Service Improving People Skills Stimulating Innovation and Change Coping with Temporariness Working in Networked Organizations Helping Employees Balance Work-Life Conflicts Creating a Positive Work Environment Improving Ethical Behavior

Responding to Globalization

Increased foreign assignments Working with people from different cultures Coping with anti-capitalism backlash Overseeing movement of jobs to countries with low-cost labor Managing people during the war on terror

Managing Workforce Diversity

The people in organizations are becoming more heterogeneous demographically Embracing diversity Changing U.S. demographics Changing management philosophy Recognizing and responding to differences
Disability Domestic Partners Race NonChristian Gender Age National Origin

Developing an OB Model

A model is an abstraction of reality: a simplified representation of some real-world phenomenon. Our OB model has three levels of analysis Each level is constructed on the prior level

Types of Study Variables

Independent (X)

Dependent (Y)

The presumed cause of the change in the dependent variable (Y). This is the variable that OB researchers manipulate to observe the changes in Y.

Predictive Ability

This is the response to X (the independent variable). It is what the OB researchers want to predict or explain. The interesting variable!

Interesting OB Dependent Variables

Productivity Transforming inputs to outputs at lowest cost. Includes the concepts of effectiveness (achievement of goals) and efficiency (meeting goals at a low cost). Absenteeism Failure to report to work a huge cost to employers. Turnover Voluntary and involuntary permanent withdrawal from an organization. Deviant Workplace Behavior Voluntary behavior that violates significant organizational norms and thereby threatens the well-being of the organization and/or any of its members.

More Interesting OB Dependent Variables

Organizational Citizenship Behavior (OCB) Discretionary behavior that is not part of an employees formal job requirements, but that nevertheless promotes the effective functioning of the organization. Job Satisfaction A general attitude (not a behavior) toward ones job; a positive feeling of one's job resulting from an evaluation of its characteristics.

The Independent Variables

The independent variable (X) can be at any of these three levels in this model: Individual Biographical characteristics, personality and emotions, values and attitudes, ability, perception, motivation, individual learning and individual decision making. Group Communication, group decision making, leadership and trust, group structure, conflict, power and politics, and work teams. Organization System Organizational culture, human resource policies and practices, and organizational structure and design.

Dependent Variables (Y)

Three Levels

Independent Variables (X)

Summary and Managerial Implications

Managers need to develop their interpersonal skills to be effective. OB focuses on how to improve factors that make organizations more effective. The best predictions of behavior are made from a combination of systematic study and intuition. Situational variables moderate cause-and-effect relationships which is why OB theories are contingent. There are many OB challenges and opportunities for managers today. The textbook is based on the contingent OB model.